Next day I trotted over to the Hall. Mr Percy Marvale was busy putting
the finishing stroke to his _Demon of the Waste_, in which the
interesting incident of the murder in the shooting-box is introduced;
and Frank and I had a long and confidential conversation in the garden.
Miss Sibylla Smith and the students of three-volume novels were for once
very nearly right in their guesses on the subject of his tutor's
daughter. He certainly was in love, if not engaged, but not exactly in
the way they had imagined; and it struck me that, in spite of his
declaration of constancy and firmness, there was still a very reasonable
chance of there being an opening for some of the bees alluded to by my
wife. For my own part, I am no believer in sentiment and romance, and
could not enter into Frank's feelings at all.
Not far from Frank's guardian's house, in Leicestershire, there was a
small white-walled villa, surrounded by pretty pleasure grounds, and
inhabited by the most enchanting family in the world. The father, a
clergyman, too much of an invalid to hold a living, and only rich enough
to struggle on in the quietest possible way, with a wife and a daughter.
The wife, of course, was all that was amiable and wise; and the
daughter, Alice, endowed with every possible perfection. As to her
beauty, it was above description, and her disinterestedness almost
incredible. Every week, and at least every day of every week, Frank
found himself at the fireside of the Reverend Mr Elstree, and no mother
and sister could be so affectionate to him as Mrs Elstree and Alice. He
was only fourteen, to be sure, when the acquaintance began, and the girl
nine or ten; so that when he was twenty-one, he could not recall by what
means, or on what occasion, he had told Alice he was devoted to her; nor
could he even recollect what method she had taken to tell him she was
delighted to hear it; but the case was, nevertheless, as complete a case
of engagement, and true love, as if he had made formal propositions on
his knees, or signed a bond on parchment. By this time he was at
Cambridge, and considered himself as much a man as undergraduates always
consider themselves--and wrote twice a-week to Alice--and heard twice
a-week in return--and looked at her portrait, which he kept in a secret
drawer of his desk, about twenty times a-day; and (which was the only
thing about it that made me think it a real instance of true love) he
never mentioned her name to one of his companions. Yet Cambridge has its
temptations even to people as constant as Amadis de Gaul. Frank was a
gay young fellow, with a good allowance--had his father's seat on
horseback, and sported a red coat whenever the hounds came within twenty
miles. He was blessed also with a capacious appetite, both for solids
and fluids, and occasionally astonished the waiter at the Eagle and
Child, by ordering in an extra basket of magnums; but, in the main, he
was steady--and looked at the little portrait with undiminished
admiration. All this time poor Mr Elstree knew nothing of the
engagement, but looked on Frank more as a son than as a mere
acquaintance, without any thought of its being in his power to attain in
reality to that degree of relationship by means of the beautiful Miss
Alice. If Frank believed this, I will be bound Miss Sibylla Smith would
not have given him credit for such stupidity. But there are innocent
minded people in the world, and poor Elstree was one of them. The visits
to the white-walled villa were continued all the vacation; love went on
increasing; and nothing could be more delightful than the description
Frank gave of the happiness of that youthful time. But black days were
in store for them. He left Cambridge, and went to London--the great
trial for country affections. The affections, by his account, continued
exactly the same; but the ideas altered--he saw other people, he mixed
with the world--he overlaid the passion that lay snug and powerful at
the bottom of his heart, with a score or two of flirtations; but, so far
from burying it, they only kept it warm. In the mean time, however, the
correspondence was not so regular as before--and perhaps the expressions
on both sides not quite so tender; for it is impossible for a man in the
Clarendon, with a carriage at the door to carry him down to Ascot, to
write about flames and arrows, which come so naturally when musing on
the Cam or Isis. And in the midst of this London career--during all
which, he assured me, he liked her better than ever--he was startled by
hearing that Mr Elstree was very ill. He hurried down to Leicestershire,
but found he was too late. The good man had died, after having learned
from his daughter the secret of her engagement, and having refused his
consent to it, not on the ground that he was too good a match for
Alice--which would be almost as vulgar a reason as if he had been too
poor--but on the ground that he was young, giddy, thoughtless, and the
wasting health and wan cheek of his daughter had told him that he was
fickle too. People in the country make so little allowance for young men
during their first season in town; and mother and daughter, in spite of
all his protestations, in spite of all the vows he made to Alice, which
she believed in her heart--were firm in breaking off the connexion, and
would see him no more. And this resolution seemed to be formed on the
maturest deliberation, and in spite of every inducement to the contrary
they kept it. He had not seen them for nearly a year. Their income, at
all times small, had been annihilated by the father's death; they left
the white-walled villa, and after bidding him farewell for ever in a
letter, and thanking him for his friendship to her father, and some few
tender recollections on her own account, Alice had begged him to forget
her! And Frank thought of her, of course, every hour of his life--tried
every means to find out where they had gone, that he might resume his
suit, and to offer them the fortune of which he had now come into full
possession--but all in vain. His friend, Mr Percy Marvale, had
undertaken to find them out within six months if they were still on the
habitable globe, and thought he had discovered that the scene of their
retirement was in our county; and with a knowledge of nature drawn from
melodramas, French and English, he had laid it down as a rule, that as
they were reduced in circumstances, Alice had gone out as a governess--
which accounted for his theories about squints and red hair. It was a
curious story; but there was perfect sincerity in all he said; and
instead of trying to dissuade him, I could not help offering my services
to discover the vanished pleiad--if she twinkled in any part of our
Worcestershire heavens.
During this long communication we had left the garden, and were lounging
slowly by the side of the river that runs through the park. We were both
engaged in the narrative, and I was no little surprised, on looking to
the other side, to see my magisterial friend, Old Smith, and his two
daughters, busy with fishing-rods. The girls were tastefully dressed--
but more to catch admiration than fish; two very showy handsome girls
they were and I could not help thinking in my secret soul that there
were not much odds to be risked on the late favourite Alice, against
such a spanker as Monimia Smith. As for Sibylla, she despised gold and
acres in comparison with genius and mustaches; and therefore, I
concluded, she intended to be the second horse to her sister, and keep
out the rest of the field. A clever, dashing, creature Monimia
certainly, with such a pretence at childishness that nobody felt any
wonder at any thing she did. And that same childishness is a very
captivating quality till a girl is rising twenty or thereabouts; but
after that time it does not take. At the same time, it is only a show
qualification after all, and may do for a ball-room, but has no chance
any where else. We looked at them without making any remark, and all
three pretended to be so busy watching, their floats, that they had no
idea--not they, poor souls!--that Frank Edwards of Bandvale Hall was
within a mile of them. Sibylla occasionally glanced towards the house,
in hopes, I suppose, of seeing Mr Percy Marvale emerge from his literary
labours; but Monimia, looking under her long beautiful eyelashes, saw
very well where we were, and threw herself into twenty attitudes of
expectation, hope, and disappointment, ad ran through the whole gamut of
a fisher's passions, in a way that would have done for a recitation of
Collins's ode; and graceful, playful, and beautiful the attitudes were--
and I saw in a moment that Frank's attention was caught. He was silent
all of a sudden, and said no more about Alice Elstree. Monimia had it
all her own way; but when she saw that her bait had taken, she
determined to play the trout a little longer. She cast herself into
finer and more captivating attitudes than ever, threw back her bonnet
till it hung at her back--her beautiful hair broke loose--and in her
hurry to pull up her hook, though I am ready to declare the float had
never moved, she pressed so vehemently on poor Old Smith, who was deep
in a contention with the root of a tree, which had held his hook
prisoner for half an hour, that he lost his footing and fell plump into
the water. If Monimia's motions were astonishing, her screams were
appalling; and though I feel sure she had no intention of drowning her
father, she had put him into tremendous hazard. The water was deep--he
could not swim a stroke--the banks were steep; and there stood Monimia
wringing her hands, while Sibylla had taken the quieter method of
showing her agitation by falling into a faint upon the grass. In a
moment Frank had left my side, dashed into the stream, and half forced,
half supported Old Smith to the side, with my assistance, brought him
safe on dry land. The girls hurried round by the bridge, and came upon
us like a charge of Cossacks, while we were attending to the half-drowned
parent on the bank.
"Where is my papa?" exclaimed Monimia--"my dear papa!"--and threw
herself beside him on the turf, showing her figure, I must say, to the
very best advantage. "And you," she cried, "his saviour--his preserver!"
--and here she actually flung herself into poor Frank's arms, and laid
her head upon his shoulder, in one of the most becoming faints I ever
saw. There being no other person worth fainting for, Sibylla retained
her composure; and as Monimia continued insensible, and Old Smith was
really chilled, and might catch his death of cold, we conveyed them
both, as carefully as we could, to the house; gave Monimia in charge to
the gardener's wife and her sister, and installed Old Smith in Frank's
own bed. I sent off a labourer on my pony for the doctor, and went to
make enquiries after Miss Monimia. She was very ill, but Sibylla hoped
she would soon be well enough to attend upon her father. Mr Percy
Marvale made a multitude of quotations from some of his own melodramas
_apropos_ to the occasion, and Sibylla replied in the same high-flown
style. It was evident they were quite used to such incidents in the
Surrey, and I left them to entertain each other. On the doctor's
arrival, he pronounced it improper to remove Mr Smith after his system
had undergone such a shock; and the same judgment, very nearly, was past
on Miss Monimia.
"I told mamma before I left home," whispered that young lady to her
sister, as she lay gracefully on the outside of the bed, "that I would
make an impression on Mr Edwards, if I could. I think this will do it,
if any thing will; for we sha'n't let papa be well enough to move for a
week. He is a delightful, fascinating man, and we have him all to
ourselves."